The Biden campaign has formed a faith-based coalition called the “Georgia Faith Leaders for Biden Leadership Council,” which attempts to bring the faith-based community together to help elect the former vice-president. According to their press release, the faith-based council aspires to bring moral clarity back to the White House.
The announcement of the leadership council comes on the heels of faith leaders across Georgia sharply criticizing President Trump’s adult sons, Eric and Don, Jr., for exploiting the Christian faith for political gain during recent campaign stops in metro Atlanta and Savannah.
“I don’t have any problem at all with them calling themselves Evangelical,” said Reginald Jackson, Presiding Bishop, 6th Episcopal District of the AME Church. “I have a problem with them calling themselves Christian because the fact of the matter is they definitely are not, this president has no morals. This president has no integrity. Everything that Christians stand for, he does not have.”
Currently, Super PACs such as the Lincoln Project and Republicans Against Trump have run ads sharply criticizing the President’s rhetoric and alleged affairs.
“I think, for his sons, it’s about power,” explained Leela Waller, Associate Pastor at the Turner Chapel AME Church. “I don’t know how much he knows about the Bible and it’s his actions. You don’t know anything about the Bible or how God is a social God and how the book teaches us how to love one another.”
During the primary season, among Black Protestant Democratic voters, 44% named Biden as their first choice – four times the share of any other candidate according to a Pew Research Center survey. With 40 days remaining until Election Day, a July 28th poll conducted by American University spells a more ominous sign: 31% of Black Americans under 30 say they probably won’t vote in this election. Half of Black survey respondents under 30 stated they don’t often vote because it “doesn’t make a difference.”
“I would tell them that it’s very important not to just look at the party,” said Jackson. “But look at the person and I think people ought to vote in their own best interests. And so let me just give some example which I would say to somebody who says to me this election doesn’t matter.
First of all look at us: we’re Black. There’s hardly a Black in this country who does not have some pre-existing condition. In fact, I contend to just be in Black and this country is a pre-existing condition. And the fact matter is; the way we’re going, the one way to cover people with pre-existing conditions [the Affordable Care Act] is going to be removed. Which means you’re going to have millions and millions of people with no insurance off that also affect how you vote that number one number to look at the issue of race in this country.”
